"World Class Baseball" - Turbografx-16/PC-Engine

AKA - "Power League"

Hot on the heels of Namco's take on baseball with Pro Yakyuu World Stadium, my will to live is now being assaulted by World Class Baseball, Hudson's take on what sounds like basically the exact same game. The two games literally came out a month apart. Maybe I'll be surprised and they'll be totally different.

The English Wikipedia gives a short synopsis of the game with little extra, but the Japanese Wikipedia goes much further-- saying that Power League is a game that represents the PC Engine, and that there are five sequels (I'm gonna have to play five of these!). Apparently the game is also known for hidden elements like teams that are references to other games or things (apparently Power League 64 has a Monster team that is all RPG monsters...).

That's really all I can think to say about what I read before playing, so... let's just play the game.

I can already foresee I'm gonna get a home run smacking this cartridge with a baseball bat.

----- Playthrough -----

My first impressions of Power League were actually pretty good. The graphics looked nice, the music was fun and bopping, there was a little happy sprite of a baseball man on the team select screen.

M-maybe this won't be so bad...! Maybe I can do this!

I started with Pennant Mode, which seemed to be the 'campaign' style mode-- much like Pro Yakyuu World Stadium it seems there are 12 teams to beat and after beating each one you're given a password to continue next time if that's what you want to do. I stuck with the 0's and decided to take on "Butter" with my team "Fiber," which sounds like a match guaranteed to give someone a terrible time in the bathroom.

Once I got into the match I thought further that the game looked much nicer than Pro Yakyuu and had a cool style to it. And of course, then the sucking started.

At least it looks nice.

The music was even more popping, but as seems to be the general way it goes, for the first couple innings I actually did alright, but it was all downhill from there. The game spiraled out of control rapidly with repeated hits from the CPU and repeated misses from me. No matter how creative my pitches, the CPU will nearly always hit, and meanwhile the CPU throws insane corkscrew pitches that change at the very last second to be out of reach.

I'll spare you the details, but as usual, I lost by a wide margin.

This blog was a mistake.

My failure to beat the first team in the league was broadcasted on national sports news. At least I got my five minutes of fame.

Hey, being on TV is being on TV.

As far as the other modes, it seems that "Open" mode allows you to simply pick two teams of your choosing and play a single game. "Watch" mode allows you to pick two teams of your choosing and watch them play a single game. "Edit" mode gives you this screen:

I'm glad that you can leave some of your pitchers and fielders back home on the farm.
Somebody needs to do it while everyone else is out playing games.

And "VS." mode allows you to play another player in multiplayer. But as always I don't have one of those, so we're done here.

----- Review -----

How long did I play?
30 minutes.

How much did I beat?
I made it 9 innings before losing at least!

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Intuitive Design: 

How easy is it to intuitively understand the game?

If you've played a baseball game up to this point and know what the point of baseball is, you've got it. The controls are nearly the same for every one I've played so far and I don't really see this changing anytime soon.

Gameplay / Difficulty: 

How rewarding does playing the game feel?

Scoring a nice hit and getting runs feels good, which is presumably why there's 800,000 baseball games in existence. Getting the opponent out feels good. In general, it's fun to win in direct competition with another team that you know is (supposedly) equipped with all the same abilities and limitations as you.

As is also usual with baseball games so far, this game is unreasonably hard (for me). I still don't know if there's something I don't know, or what, but I find it nearly impossible to squeeze pitches past the CPU that are actually in the strike zone. If they're in the zone, they will hit it probably 80% of the time. And this is the easiest match in the game!

How can you hold a bat like that and still be so accurate?
(By the way, apparently it's called "Shinto priest batting form" which is awesome.)

(It's because it looks like a Shinto priest doing an exorcism.)

Depth: 

How deep/long is the game?

There's 12 teams to play and one boss team, again, like Pro Yakyuu World Stadium (at least I think that's how that game worked). Every match is still just going to be baseball, so in that sense I wouldn't expect a lot of evolution. Being able to edit your team seems like a nice change of pace if that's what you feel you want to do. I don't really know how you would know which players you want or if they're actually different aside from name, though.

Sound / Graphics: 

How's the sound? How are the graphics?

In my opinion the graphics are a little better than Pro Yakyuu, which is the easiest comparison for most of this since it came out a month beforehand. There's something a little more crisp and detailed about them that was lacking there in retrospect.

I really like the music in World Class Baseball and it honestly makes me want to play the game a little more just to listen to it, except for the part where it also makes me want to snap my controller in half playing a baseball game. I need a break. Or a more modern baseball game... (I'm gonna regret saying that soon since All-Star Baseball 2002 is rapidly approaching me on Gamecube).

Personal Chord: 

Does the game have that undefinable "something" for me?

I mean, no. Other than the music not really. Baseball is probably my least favorite sport of all by the way-- I don't know if you could tell that. Not to alienate you if you like it, I'm sure there are lots of awesome things about it if you can get into it; I've just never been able to get into it. Even when I played it as a kid I didn't like it.

Should You Play: 

Is there a reason to even bother with this one?

Seriously, there's like a million baseball games. Just play the one you like. The music in this one is nice and the graphics are pretty good. If you need a baseball game on your Turbografx-16 and it's 1989 then sure, play it. You can get a copy on eBay for like $9.

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